Friday, April 07, 2006

So my birthday was yesterday, which, like every year sends shivers through me wondering where time has gone (I honestly still feel like college wasn’t that long ago - in reality its been over 10). Since "age-day" was on a weekday this year I thought it would be fun to take the day off of work and do something mellow. So I took my daughter to the Getty here in L.A. for a day of culture, reflection, sketching, and meandering. It turned out to be a pretty interesting experience since I’ve never actually spent an entire day with my daughter somewhere without my wife. My wife can get her to do things I can't, like eat vegetables or change her diaper like a pit stop operator. Then there's the restroom issue, but thankfully they have this cool thing now called a "family restroom" which was a lifesaver. She was really quite good in her stroller while in the galleries, I was a little paranoid that she wouldn't be so quiet, but she's very inquisitive about people and her surroundings.

But the interesting thing about the whole day was the question I got from people in one form or another -"where's mommy?". I usually made some lighthearted joke about it and moved on. Although after some thought, it really is depressing that most dads aren't expected or normally don't spend a day with their kids - or maybe its just dads with an infant and/or toddler. Even afterwards telling people about it, I still get an odd reaction like I breastfeed from a man-boob or something strange like that. I can just imagine what kind of reactions stay-at-home dads get in public. Maybe they just slap people with their man-boob bra for asking stupid questions.